New Release Speculation Based On Facts We Have

5) wears flip-flops in summer

6) owns a modular system

7) recently turned into a cat

  On 2/5/2014 at 1:05 AM, 123 said:

Any significance with Nanou2

Let's create a spreadsheet of all the embarrassing shit we say on watmm.

If that quote is from Richard, then it doesn't sound like all of his business dealings were "really good" deals after all, contrary to that hearsay post we were all talking about recently. Actually, that sounds like a really shitty business deal, if it means he's not going to release new stuff simply for that reason. Unfortunately, because of this stupid game of chicken between him and the big label, the people who are suffering most are the fans, not the fucking suits at Warner or whatever. That's a bullshit arrangement.

who cares what name he releases under?

  On 2/5/2014 at 8:17 PM, messiaen said:

who cares what name he releases under, as long as we know what the alias is.

fik sta

  On 2/5/2014 at 7:12 PM, Drahken said:

 

 

  Quote

I hadn’t give them a record for like three years. And I said to them: „Alright I’ll give you like a double album but you have let me do my own label afterwards.“ And they just said „Yes“! I tried to do it with Warner Brothers (Aphex Twins record company in the US and Japan) as well but they are more hard to convince. I said like: „I want to do Aphex Twin on Rephlex“. And they were just going like: „No way, we’ve bought you, we own you.“ It was going back and forth. I was going: „If you don’t say yes, you will never get anything.“And then they were like: „Well ok, then we won’t get anything.“ I’m allowed to use AFX on Rephlex so I’ll just have to go back to that.

 

May I ask the sauce?

"them" at the begging is Wrap Records?

  On 2/5/2014 at 8:09 PM, apriorion said:

If that quote is from Richard, then it doesn't sound like all of his business dealings were "really good" deals after all, contrary to that hearsay post we were all talking about recently. Actually, that sounds like a really shitty business deal, if it means he's not going to release new stuff simply for that reason. Unfortunately, because of this stupid game of chicken between him and the big label, the people who are suffering most are the fans, not the fucking suits at Warner or whatever. That's a bullshit arrangement.

Let's pull this ol' Joyrex post out of the closet again:

Here's a bit more on the Aphex Twin/WARP/Sire/Warner Bros./contract situation (mind you, this is from first, second and third-hand sources, so take from it what you will):

In 1999, Richard was paid by Sire/Warner a rather large advance for the next Aphex Twin album - Windowlicker was essentially the "single", with the album to follow later that year, in the summer (WL came out in April you might recall). At the time, I was in direct contact with the guy at Sire/WB that did the US promotion for Aphex, and was negotiating to take over the aphex-twin.com domain and run it as the "official" US site for Aphex. Unfortunately, that fell through, and my dealings with MusicFans in regards to joyrex.com were taking off, so no big deal.

Rumour has it he was paid US 90,000 for the advance (this was based in part on the success of Come To Daddy, even though Sire/WB got burned badly by the commercial flop that was SAW II, to the point that no other ambient-style released by any artist had to have upper management approval before being released). Anyways, back on topic, so the advance was paid, and WARP was the go-between to get Richard to deliver the album.

However, the amount of promotion that Sire did for Windowlicker (the video, site, etc.) was a bit much, and realistically, Richard didn't intend on doing an album so soon after releasing Windowlicker, if at all - some details of the contract were as such it didn't have an explicit date of when Richard had to deliver a new LP, and when the relationship between WARP/Sire/Richard soured on all fronts, things went quiet with Richard laughing all the way to the bank. WARP finally convinced Richard to release DrukQs, meet his contractual obligations with both WARP and Sire, and finally end the whole fiasco, except for the whole use of "Aphex Twin" as an artist name.

I'm told that somehow Sire/WB had (or still has) some sort of contractual right over the use of the name "Aphex Twin", hence WARP or Richard not using it again, out of fear of legal action. Analord 10 was an exception due to the name just appearing on the record (and it being produced in quantities of less than 1000, since it came bundled with the binder), and being released under the alias Analord, and not Aphex Twin (even though the tracks on the Analord 10 record are accredited to Aphex Twin). I'm not sure if Richard will ever use Aphex Twin for a full-blown release, but you will NOT ever see a Aphex Twin record released on Sire/WB in the States ever again (there was no domestic release of 26 Mixes for Cash due to this), and probably due to the whole fiasco, probably no more Aphex Twin releases on WARP - of course, they still sell his back catalogue, so they're hardly going to drop him from the roster anytime soon, and despite the working relationship souring, they still are quite happy to make money off his popularity regardless.

Regarding 26 Mixes - the whole reason the release came about was due to an alternate label (have no idea who, was never told) compiling all of Richard's remixes (which were all done for other labels than WARP) for a compilation, and WARP got wind of this and scrambled to compile it and get it out before the competition did. The problem was, many of the masters were missing, and Richard (supposedly) didn't have them anymore (as they were sent to the labels he did the remix for), or (supposedly) couldn't be arsed to look for them.

I was even contacted (by WARP) regarding if I had any CDs of the remixes as WARP was willing to use a CD instead of a master recording for the compilation, and they (rumoured) even resorted to using MP3s on a few tracks. This also was the reason there was no artwork for the release (no time for tDR (the Designer's Republic) to do any art or real layout), and why they went with the simple plain colour layout. The chocolate coins were a quick last-minute promotion to get more pre-sales lined up to ensure a healthy run (or runs if you've ever eaten one, ha).

Bottom line is, you will never see an Aphex Twin release on WARP ever again (unless of course enough money is in the equation, and any potential legal dangers have subsided), or a domestic (US) Aphex Twin release - in fact, with Richard content on using Analord and now The Tuss to release his more recent work, I think it's safe to say the Aphex Twin name is dead for all intents and purposes.

• Joyrex ( December 2008, http://forum.watmm.com/topic/41090-whats-the-story-with-warp-and-richard/page__st__30__p__908698&?do=findComment&comment=908698 )

"(or runs if you've ever eaten one, ha)."

lol

Hey does that mean he can't use the logo as well? I'm saying this because they are selling t-shirts again.

It's a shame, if he'd been coming up in this day and age he could have just distributed the music digitally, ended up with a greater proportion of the cash from music sales and so had plenty of free capital to fund his own flashy music videos to upload for views on vimeo and youtub, using his mate as director. There would be no need for distribution deals with the devil. Tax accountants would still be required though, and perhaps a move to switzerland. hjeh.

:'(

You seem a little down.

/gives logakght an hug. Not just a hug damnit, but an hug!!

That's what I'm talkin about! I knew there had to be some legal reason (3rd hand sources acknowledged). My baseless theory is that he did Analord 10 (released first) to test the waters and got shut down, but with an agreement that the two 10 tracks would stand. He then gave the proverbial one digit salute by using the Aphex logo as the cover of chosen lords and bookending with the Aphex tracks - essentially making it an aphex album. Of course, didn't do much marketing. But maybe didn't care.

Again, baseless speculation... Similar to about 90% of this thread.

But agreed, it's the music, not the release name.

spoiler that gif usagi, geeze

no. it represents exactly how I feel about this continued speculation-masturbation.

still love you tho iwc

Yeah that's great but it was stressing me out too. So i've spoilered it.

how do you spoiler things?

[spoiler ]text that you want to write. or link[/spoiler ]

I like how little music he's actually put out.

  On 2/6/2014 at 7:32 AM, Audioblysk said:

how do you spoiler things?

by revealing critical plot information to the chagrin of those who have not yet reached that juncture in the story.

  On 2/6/2014 at 4:52 AM, r2c said:

But agreed, it's the music, not the release name.

On one hand, I completely agree. At the end I don't care about the name, as long as he releases something.

But on the other hand, there is a tiny tiny part of myself that says "it must be an Aphex Twin album". Not AFX, not The Tuss or something else. Aphex Twin. For the legend, I guess.

aphex twin release speculation thread, fact database update: (beta version)

I love the original typos lol.

From speculating on "facts," to sacrificing virgins and creating spreadsheets including Rdj turning into a cat... this is all incredibly productive.

And I bet the cat in that one picture wasn't really even him.